GEOGRAPHIES OF MOBILITY AND IMMOBILITY: NURSE PRODUCTION AND MIGRATION FROM INDIA

Abstract

This thesis examines the social and spatial production of nurses and their international mobility in the contemporary migration process. Drawing upon extensive quantitative and qualitative data gathered from fieldwork carried out in Delhi and Bangalore, it first interrogates how multiple identities not only shape nursing production but also determine ‘why only certain groups of people move’. In particular, the thesis analyses the effect of ethnicity, religion, and gender in understanding people’s choices towards nursing as an occupation and in influencing the international migration of nurses from India. The interplay among the dimensions of identity, occupation, and migration creates varying aspirations of people towards occupation and migration. Second, the thesis also explores the participation of men in nursing to unravel the varying masculine perceptions towards the occupation in India. This in turn challenges western-centric understandings of gender ideologies and practices of men in nursing. Third, the thesis investigates the changing roles of social networks in nursing (as skilled) migration and the ways recruitment agencies impact these networks in carving migratory paths and the migration propensities of different groups of nurses. Theoretically, I engage with Bourdieu’s notions of ‘habitus’, ‘doxa’,’field’ and ‘capital’, as well as the concept of social networks, to conceptualize the research